Hi All,
I just completed the upgrade of a Weaver Brass UP 8444 FEF-3. I got the engine for a great price, but the reverse board was bad. The motor did not have a clean signal and ran very rough. After a short time of running, the motor just quit, which was ok since I planned on upgrading it anyway. So I ordered from Electric RR a Cruise Commander, a Railsounds for a large Steam Engine (which had the exact whistle of the prototype), and an Electo-coupler. I also got a super-chuffer board from Henning's Trains. To upgrade the smoke unit (the original had dual sleuth units), I found an MTH smoke unit on the bay and then got a Lionel FEF-3 smoke unit funnel (p/n 6101116201). Lastly, I got an AC/DC to DC variable board set to 2 volts to drive the marker lights on the tender.
I was able to put all the boards in the tender. I first installed the speaker and then used double sided tape to secure the sound board. I installed the Cruise commander, and put the super-chuffer board on top of the R4LC board. Lastly, I taped the AC/DC to DC Board onto the tender frame as well. All were wired into an existing 10 pin harness I had gotten from Train America Studios back in the day. I used a dull fingernail top-coat and electrical tape to insulate the tender from the frame so the TMCC would work. Here are pictures of the tender:
On the engine side, I decided to use the existing light board because I really liked the mars light effect and it already ran off of track power, so I did not have to re-wire any of that. For the harness, I was able to remove the Weaver 4-pin harness and put the TAS one in its place with little modifications needed.
Next I worked on the smoke unit. I affixed the funnel to the smoke unit (drilling the holes on the funnel to be bigger to fit the MTH screws). I also had to grind the funnel stacks to be slightly smaller in the outer diameter so it would fit in the smoke stack.
I then got the unit in place and made a locking bracket out of styrene to hold it in place (in the second picture you can see the funnel in the stack). I also used a piece of styrene to protect the wiring (also seen in two pictures).
Lastly, I installed the magnets on for the chuff sensor on one of the drivers. I used tape to set the 90 degree positions so I would know where to glue them in place. I then used JB Weld to hold the sensor in place.
After oiling everything and loading smoke fluid, I put it through its paces pulling a UP passenger train consisting of an MTH Auxiliary Tender (MT-3022) which I also upgraded by putting in center rail pickups and a Mini Commander EX to drive the electro couplers. The ID is the same as the engine (84) and I set the rear coupler set to fire when I hit the front coupler button. The front coupler fires when I hit the rear coupler button (so it opens at the same time as the tender coupler on the engine). Next in the consist is 3 of the 4 Weaver Express UP Box Cars and then the whole 7 car set of the 49er set Weaver made (I will be upgrading the lights in them to LED soon). I know the cars are not prototypical, but they look great.
Here is a video of the upgrade - sorry in advance for the shaky video. Also sorry that the sound is not too loud - the wife and daughter were asleep at the time of the making of the video. 
I hope you like the results as much as I do.
